The fifth annual Youth Fishing Rodeo will be held at Lake Bill Waller Saturday morning and is presented by the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries & Parks.
The event drew more than 220 children last year, and organizers are expecting even more to attend. Lake Bill Waller and Lake Columbia Manager Dustin Brumfield said the lake was stocked with 1,300 catfish Tuesday morning in preparation.
“What we do is rope off an area of the lake and bring in catfish from the Delta and stock them in that netted-off area,” he said. “We do that in advance so they’ll be good and hungry when the kids get here.”
Registration begins at 7 a.m., and there will be a variety of activities to accompany the fishing.
“It will be a family day with activities, games and door prizes,” Brumfield said. “We generally set up an archery range for kids to shoot, and we provide them a small snack.”
Brumfield added the focus is to get children interested and knowledgeable of the outdoors from a young age.
“The overall goal is outreach of our future generation of outdoorsmen. We want them to be aware of the resources they have right here at home,” he said. “We want to give those that may not have an opportunity to do this on a regular basis like a lot of us around here do an opportunity to go out and do it too in a safe and controlled environment.”
The Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries & Parks thanks all who have helped in preparation of the event.
“We’ve had people donate, donate time and door prizes, and we appreciate that,” Brumfield said.
The rodeo will continue until roughly 11 a.m., and organizers encourage attendees to bring their own tackle, bait, cooler and fish stringers. For more information, call (601) 736-1861.
Pictured Above: More than 200 children fished Lake Bill Waller last year during the annual Youth Fishing Rodeo, presented by the Mississippi Department of Wildlife, Fisheries and Parks, and organizers are expecting an even larger turnout Saturday. | File Photo
